The Stories We Tell - An Actor Miscarries
This is, ‘The Stories We Tell’, a weekly series of true accounts in all things motherhood. These 100% vulnerable, raw and ferociously honest tales are from the LA-based storytelling event, Mothers Unleashed. During the holiday season, however, we’re highlighting stories that haven’t been shared before. This is Brooke’s story about her miscarriage - and her inspiring New Year’s Eve update. Brooke is a mother, actress and writer living in New York.
I never really considered the possibility of a miscarriage. My body would never do that, I thought. I started telling people the split second I found out I was pregnant… without fear… without superstition. Ya, I thought it was weird that I didn’t get sick this time. And I worried that, without dropping the 20 pounds from first trimester puking, I would turn into a cow. I worried that my career, already in the shitter from my two previous babies/lack of bookings/new city, would never recover. These were the things I was considering. Not the idea that the baby I was planning my future life around would have passed away inside my body 3-4 weeks earlier unbeknownst to me. But that’s what happened.
I had signed up for this agent workshop the month prior. And it was $150. “Show up for your life,” was what I heard on a podcast earlier in the day. So I decided to go. I knew it was a bad idea. I knew they would be filling out forms dissecting everything from my headshot, to my physical appearance, to my level of preparedness. I knew that I would probably read something that would likely hurt my feelings, but there I found myself, performing a scene from The Blacklist while free-bleeding my dead baby into a Dollar Store pad.
These people had no idea what was going on. To them, I was just another out-of-work actor who hadn’t brushed her hair. They didn’t know it was because I ran out of time while driving my two other children, in a panic, halfway to Albany so I could make it back to the city in time to present my half-assed self... while my curling iron sat, unused, in the passenger seat of my car. They couldn’t have known, that the next morning, I would be having a D and C, which I had been calling a DNC, like an idiot, to all the people I prematurely announced my pregnancy to. Maybe if they knew, they would have marked more than “okay” on my eval sheet. Because what I was doing felt anything but. It was crazy. Crazy to put my incredibly vulnerable self in the hands of a panel of monsters who didn’t give a shit. If there was an option for “brave,” surely they would have circled it. Instead, I was, “acceptable,” not “excellent.” “Okay,” not “great.” There was no option for “successfully trying to move forward.” Only “average” or “below.” Fuck these people and their opinions. And fuck myself for serving my heart and hope to them on a platter only to have it tossed in the dirty dishes section of the cafeteria... bits still stuck on the tray.
It's over now, though. I did it. The very worst of my talent assessment sheets are in the trash and it’s 1:11am. At 6:25, Tommy's alarm will be going off and we’ll begin the process of getting to the hospital to remove the baby/tissue/who knows what else, from my insides. I’m not sure how to feel about it, really. Of course I’m afraid to go under... and the sentimental part of me thinks that the baby, who still hasn’t left me, wanted to stay with its mamma. And tomorrow, I am about to have a procedure to suck it the f*ck out of my body. The thought pains me. It seems wrong. So does dying of infection, so there is that. I want to protect it, though, and honor it, and take the decaying lump of whatever is left, with me in a baggie, to a beautiful field and bury it under a peaceful tree. Not send it off to get genetic testing to see what went wrong, after which, they, what, throw it in one of those hazardous materials bins, with all the other babies that aren't quite right enough to continue growing? Why does that matter now? I don’t want that for what was going to be my third child.
Tommy just crossed the middle line of our bed into my space. He’s been sleeping for a few hours now. Who knows what he’s feeling inside. Is it different for a man? I want to push him back over so I can continue feeling alone. Not sure why I want that right now but it’s what I desire more than anything. To just get under my covers with an eye mask and earplugs and numb myself out with Valium. I have some, actually. From a girls trip to Mexico in January. Where I prayed, under the light of a super-moon, for another baby.
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Hello, anyone reading! It’s 7:08 on New Year’s Eve night and Amelia just shot me a note saying she was going to publish what I wrote! I’m sitting here, in my car, as my two toddlers are sleeping, waiting to head into a party. I’m feeling really sick because... I’m 10 weeks pregnant! My miscarriage was in late August and it took my body a minute to bounce back. Random bleeding, missed periods, mega emotions. I hadn’t yet had my D and C when I wrote what I wrote, and something interesting happened that I thought would be nice to share. A brush with the afterlife perhaps?
After the surgery, while in the recovery room alone, I opened my eyes and saw a little girl next to my bed. I could only see the side of her face, but she was just sitting there. Waiting? Making sure I was ok? I dunno, but I was very aware that I was still kooky from the drugs. I was doing the thing, when you’re lucid dreaming, where you squeeze your eyes to make the image disappear, but it didn’t. There she sat until I closed my eyes and drifted off to sleep. When I awoke, my husband was there and I asked him if he saw the girl, and he was obviously like, “Uhhh no?”
We never found out the sex of either of my two prior babies until delivery, (so few positive surprises in this lifetime, someone once told me) so I didn’t know if it was a boy or a girl. I wondered if this meant it was a girl. At my follow up appointment to review the genetic testing I found out the problem. It was a freak thing that happened when the sperm hit the egg. A problem with Trisomy 13. This particular genetic mutation is not conducive to life. The doctor said that I could have carried this baby for 5 months, 6 months, or even gone full term, and at any point it could have died inside of me, or worse – I could have delivered a dead baby. So what happened really was for the best. I’m of the belief that our bodies know what to do, and I trust it.
Obviously that didn’t make anything easier but you know what, I’m okay! I feel good. And, to tell you the truth, I kinda felt, in my gut, that something wasn’t right from the start. I had hyperemesis with my first two and the last time, I felt great. I thought that was so weird, and something I mentioned often before I lost the baby. As I was leaving the doctor's office, I asked him if he knew if it was a boy or a girl. “It was a girl,” he said.
So here I am, thankfully sick as a dog, in this toasty warm car, New Year's pants unbuttoned until it’s time to get out, writing this update! I had my genetic testing done a few days ago and in 7-10 business days, I’ll know if things are good to go... even though you never can tell in this crazy world. One thing I do know – I’ll start 2020 with gratitude in my heart and a baby in my belly!
